Language Boundaries Research Articles

Distant-Reading Communities: Monolingualisation in Fin-de-Siècle European Literary Historiography

Abstract A return to earlier forms of distant reading multilingual corpora allows us to reflect on the monolingual authorial position that manages and mediates the language diversity and linguistic specificity (literariness) of multilingual corpora with the objective of fostering supranational (imagined) communities of readers (Anderson, 1983). Revisiting the distant-reading practices of fin-de-siècle Britain can help us identify historiographical focal points and priorities, provide an understanding of the scope and circumference of the corpus, and reveal the conceptions of gain and loss perceived as integral to distant reading. The tension between enrichment and dispossession inherent in the practice of literary historiography is acute when it comes to multilingual corpora, compiled to facilitate a crossing and re-weaving of the boundaries of language, understanding, and community. In the 12-volume series Periods of European Literature, edited and, in part, written by the journalist, literary historian, and Chair of Rhetoric and English Literature at Edinburgh University, George Saintsbury (1845–1933), Anglophone comparatists represent the multilingual corpora of exemplar works, gauging the necessity for, or dispensability of, translation, and managing the “great unread”, which, in this case, equates the “great unreadable”. In their desire to build imagined communities of readers of European literature, Saintsbury and his contributors tend to operate in a monolingual supralinguistic sphere in which languages, authors, and works are named, passages are occasionally quoted, but in which no reading of literature, neither on the side of the comparatist, nor of the reader, takes place. Literary language is thus only tangentially part of literary historiography.

Vroegmiddeleeuwse funeraire diversiteit en de diepste dialectgrenzen in de Nederlanden

The most prominent dialect boundaries in the Dutch language area run from north to south, ending in the southwest between the rivers Scheldt and Dender. Notably, one isogloss separates an eastern region with long vowels fronted by i-umlaut, from a western region lacking that feature. This paper examines the main historical linguistic perspectives on the origins of this complex phenomenon integrating historical and archaeological evidence. A general explanation for the dialect boundaries posits a confrontation between an Ingvaeonic or North Sea Germanic movement from the west and a Frankish movement from the (north)east. The stabilisation of this confrontation, particularly the umlaut-isogloss between the Scheldt and the Dender, remains unresolved and is one of the most intriguing aspects of the Germanic colonisation of the region. Although historical sources are sparse, recent archaeological research has provided new insights. Archaeology, which studies human traces left in the ground - including living forms, artefacts, agriculture and burial practices – has revealed that early medieval cremation rites coincide with the umlaut-isogloss in that region, revealing a convergence between archaeological and historical linguistic evidence. Northern populations, familiar with Ingvaeonic customs, practised cremation, giving the oldest Ingvaeonic elements in the Low Countries both a cultural and linguistic identity. Alongside the Franks, the Saxons also contributed significantly to the colonisation history of the area. Therefore, it is essential to outline the historical knowledge of the first appearances of the Saxons, Franks and Thuringians and their interactions. Contemporary sources such as the Byzantine author Procopius (c. 550) are valuable for a better understanding of colonisation on both sides of the Channel and the North Sea. The roots of the umlaut-isoglosses in the Ingvaeonic continuum prompt a discussion of Ingvaeonisms and their early manifestations, including place names ending in -inga haim, within the broader context of the Dutch-Roman language boundary.

Epilogue

Abstract In this text, we discuss the challenges of researching historical methods of teaching science and we emphasize the importance of scientific materials held in academic collections as sources for understanding past teaching practices. As a case study, the text presents the scientific exchange between Germany and Russia in the nineteenth century, in which scientific instruments played a crucial role in communicating research practices across language boundaries. Because it is impossible to access scientific materials in their historical contexts and written sources rarely describe them, we advocate an interactive approach, convinced that engaging with scientific materials opens deeper insights into historical learning settings. With this approach, we take up the central role of materiality in knowledge creation, which has become established in recent decades and has driven a shift from text-based studies to material-based studies in the history of science. We propose to incorporate this change into the practice of teaching history of science.

“Th’oppressor’s wrong,” or, what’s Hamlet to the Borderlands?

AbstractThis article offers a critical analysis of two poetic appropriations of Hamlet’s “To be or not to be” soliloquy: “El Hamlet Fronterizo” by Guillermo Gómez-Peña and “To be a Pocha or not to be” by Iris De Anda. Both poets use the languages, geographies, and ontological concerns of the US–Mexico Borderlands to reimagine the Danish prince’s famously introspective speech as a performance text that reflects their lived experiences and consciousnesses as border subjects. For Gómez-Peña and De Anda, the figure of Hamlet becomes a means through which to reject Western colonial worldviews, to refuse assimilation, and to center Borderlands ways of knowing, being, and doing. When Hamlet’s soliloquy is reimagined in these ways, the most urgent question is not whether or not to be but rather what it means to be someone whose existence is made vulnerable precisely because it exceeds the increasingly policed boundaries of nation, language, race, and gender.

Barriers to research usage for Saudi Arabia's emergency medical technicians

In Saudi Arabia, Emergency Medical Technicians (EMTs) play a pivotal position in prehospital care, yet several obstacles obstruct their powerful usage of research findings. Despite the growing emphasis on evidence-based total exercise in healthcare, Saudi EMTs stumble upon multifaceted demanding situations hindering the uptake of studies of their clinical exercise. These hurdles encompass various domain names, which include confined access to updated research materials because of subscription charges and language boundaries, inadequate education in critical appraisal capabilities and studies interpretation, a loss of organizational assistance, and time constraints inside their disturbing work schedules. Moreover, the healthcare machine's cultural factors and hierarchical structures can deter EMTs from thinking about established practices or searching out new, proof-based methods. Addressing these barriers necessitates tailor-made interventions and supplying open entry to pertinent research, imparting focused education applications in studies literacy, fostering a supportive organizational lifestyle that values and encourages research utilization, and emphasizing the relevance of evidence-primarily based exercise in improving patient consequences. By mitigating these barriers, Saudi Arabia can empower its EMTs to integrate modern-day research findings into their scientific decision-making, improving the quality and efficacy of emergency medical services in the area in the long run.

Translanguaging for English Language Education: Uncovering Thai EFL Students’ Insights

Translanguaging pedagogy has gained attention in recent years in language education; yet, there is limited research on how it is utilized and perceived by university students in Thailand. This study therefore examines the translanguaging practices and perceptions of Thai university students regarding incorporating such practices in classrooms with strict language boundary policy. The mixed method study analyzes questionnaire (N=77), observation and interview (N=10) data from students using descriptive statistics and qualitative content analysis, respectively. While this study participants are only those observed to practice translanguaging in the classroom, however, the results indicated that only 84% of the students found translanguaging (i.e., using their L1 and other repertoire resources) in the classroom for content learning and meaning-making beneficial, while the others (16%) still prefer a strict English only practice. Moreover, the results showed the students’ overall positive views on incorporating translanguaging in different classroom situations to assist low proficiency students’ learning and enhance classroom interaction and participation since most of Thai teachers frequently use their L1 with students. Some students further highlighted challenges in implementing this strategy in Thailand, despite its practical benefits for English language education in Thailand. The study also highlights the implications of this practice for Thailand and beyond.

Базовые понятия лингвоэтнологического подхода к идентификации личности

The article describes the primordial linguoethnological approach to the basic notion of ethnicity and compares linguoethnic identification with a person’s ethnic self-identification. The definition of the basic concepts of linguoethnology is given: «linguoethnos», «native language» and «nation-al language». The linguoethnos is interpreted as an association of people who have an identical native language. In native languages, the primordial definition is used as a functionally first lan-guage. The boundaries of the national language are determined based on four characteristics: lin-guonim certainty, ethnic attachment, the presence of a literary language, and the presence of an official status. A typology of linguoethnoses is given, represented by a superlinguoethnos, a basic linguoethnos and a sublinguoethnos. For the basic linguoethnos as the basis of linguoethnic divi-sion, isomorphic (basic, transformed and selective) and non-isomorphic (genetic and conjunctur-al) models of the correlation of linguoethnic identity and ethnic self-identification are distin-guished.

Black Languaging IS Translanguaging: We Not Just Talkin Bout It, We Bout It Bout It!

Purpose: The purpose of this article is to provide a foundational understanding of translanguaging in order to conceptualize Black Languaging as translanguaging and to expand our definition of multilingualism and reframe how we think about Black Language in schools. Method: The authors summarize seminal literature in translanguaging and raciolinguistic ideologies in order to theorize about Black Language within a translanguaging framework. Results: Centering Black Languaging within a translanguaging framework further implicates the sociopolitical ideologies that shape our conceptualizations of language and dialect and the educational experiences of racially and linguistically minoritized students. Conclusion: A sociopolitically informed definition of Black Language allows us to blur the boundaries of languages and dialects and think of all students—especially racially minoritized students—as translanguaging in co-community.

Crip translingualism

Abstract Forms of immobility both limit unqualified human agency and enable diverse channels of mobility. In this sense, mobility and immobility work together. Certain philosophical movements such as Southern theories and disability studies treat constraints, sedentariness, and boundaries as needing to be respected and accommodated in any inquiry. This article draws from these schools to theorize disruptions and constraints as resources in the circulation of languages, texts, and meanings. To index this generative role of constraints in communication, I adopt the term “crip” from theorizations in disability studies. “Crip” invokes the paradoxical reality that while being crippled poses disruptions in mobility, this rupture also generates new knowledge and possibilities into the flow of life (McRuer, 2006). This article explains how crip translingualism would treat ruptures, constraints, and boundaries as resourceful for meaning making. This is a corrective to certain previous theorizations that have treated translingualism as based on unrestricted flows and fluidities, influenced by dominant orientations to mobility. I illustrate from a classroom literacy interaction where the ruptures posed by the heritage languages of multilingual students motivated everyone to adopt creative strategies to expand the meaning of “meaning,” redefine literacy as negotiated, and develop ethical dispositions to collaborate in communicating across language boundaries. I argue that the incomprehensions and vulnerabilities created by language diversity actually motivate everyone to develop strategies to creatively read and write. In this manner, constraints don’t stifle the text or students, but mobilize new flows of meanings and interactions.

Towards a reference ontology for a data valuation business capability

ABSTRACT Despite its recognition as primary asset, enterprises struggle to determine data value due to fragmented and impractical approaches. This paper develops a reference ontology for Data Valuation Business Capabilities (DVBC) leveraging the systematic approach for building ontologies, ArchiMate and integrating scientific insights with ex-ante expert interview validation. Comprising twelve groupings and 66 components, anchored in established ontologies and assessed against (non)-functional requirements, the ontology shapes the fragmented data valuation landscape into a structuring frame for enterprises. While advancing value modelling in information systems research, the ontology faces limitations like detailed process modelling deficiency, ex-post validation potential, and modelling language boundaries.

“It’s normal. That’s just my life”

Abstract This study explores Tatar-Russian bilinguals’ dynamic translanguaging and tranßcripting practices in Tatar, Russian, English, and Arabic. Based on interviews with six Tatar-Russian bilinguals as well as their written social media postings and audio recordings of voice messages over six months, the study illustrates the participants’ linguistic practices and their perceptions of bilingualism and relevant practices. The results demonstrate that the bilinguals engaged in various forms of translanguaging practices and regarded them as their everyday practices, emphasizing their ordinariness for bilingual interaction. The results also show that they expanded and reinvented their translanguaging into creative and playful tranßcripting practices in social media, regardless of their divergent attitudes towards each of the languages. The bilinguals projected their identity as cool multilingual youth through the tranßcripting practices that cross the linguistic boundaries between Russian (dominant state language), Tatar (dominant local), Arabic (religious), and English (peripheral global). By examining complex and dynamic relationships between multiple languages in an underrepresented region, this study highlights how translanguaging and tranßcripting practices reflect multilinguals’ everyday practices and their dynamic identity that go beyond the boundaries of the local languages and cultures.

On the Mode of Existence of Mute Law and the Inference of Cryptotypes

A widespread thesis in the analytical theory of law is that norms exist as linguistic entities. Rodolfo Sacco is one of the authors who have most fruitfully insisted, on the contrary, that there is no necessary correlation between norms and language, not even in the specific context of law. He thus extended the conceptualisation of legal normativity well beyond the boundaries of language through the notions of cryptotype and mute law. This paper takes into account two alternative hypotheses to the hypothesis that norms exist as linguistic entities, which are respectively based on the concepts of deontic state-of-affairs and deontic noema. Both hypotheses are tested for their applicability to the phenomena investigated by Sacco under the notion of mute law, notably with reference to cryptotypes. The question is raised then of how the existence of cryptotypes can be inferred from behaviour. The paper emphasizes the role that can be played in this context by nomotrophic behaviour, that is, the behaviour that consists in a reaction to the violation of a norm.

Large language models leverage external knowledge to extend clinical insight beyond language boundaries.

Large Language Models (LLMs) such as ChatGPT and Med-PaLM have excelled in various medical question-answering tasks. However, these English-centric models encounter challenges in non-English clinical settings, primarily due to limited clinical knowledge in respective languages, a consequence of imbalanced training corpora. We systematically evaluate LLMs in the Chinese medical context and develop a novel in-context learning framework to enhance their performance. The latest China National Medical Licensing Examination (CNMLE-2022) served as the benchmark. We collected 53 medical books and 381149 medical questions to construct the medical knowledge base and question bank. The proposed Knowledge and Few-shot Enhancement In-context Learning (KFE) framework leverages the in-context learning ability of LLMs to integrate diverse external clinical knowledge sources. We evaluated KFE with ChatGPT (GPT-3.5), GPT-4, Baichuan2-7B, Baichuan2-13B, and QWEN-72B in CNMLE-2022 and further investigated the effectiveness of different pathways for incorporating LLMs with medical knowledge from 7 distinct perspectives. Directly applying ChatGPT failed to qualify for the CNMLE-2022 at a score of 51. Cooperated with the KFE framework, the LLMs with varying sizes yielded consistent and significant improvements. The ChatGPT's performance surged to 70.04 and GPT-4 achieved the highest score of 82.59. This surpasses the qualification threshold (60) and exceeds the average human score of 68.70, affirming the effectiveness and robustness of the framework. It also enabled a smaller Baichuan2-13B to pass the examination, showcasing the great potential in low-resource settings. This study shed light on the optimal practices to enhance the capabilities of LLMs in non-English medical scenarios. By synergizing medical knowledge through in-context learning, LLMs can extend clinical insight beyond language barriers in healthcare, significantly reducing language-related disparities of LLM applications and ensuring global benefit in this field.

She Shuts Her English Channel in Her Brain: Racial and Linguistic Ordering during Kindergarten Practicums

During their kindergarten placements, teacher candidates are learning to teach with young children who may be experiencing linguistic and racial hierarchies in a formal institutional setting for the first time. The purpose of this research is to understand how teacher candidates make sense of the socially constructed boundaries of language and race in their practicum placements in kindergarten classrooms. In our critically informed inquiry, we draw on translanguaging and LangCrit to understand the process of language teaching and learning in kindergarten classrooms. The three teacher candidates in this article, Yu, Fie, and Charlotte, took a required course on supporting multilingual students in the mainstream classroom as part of their requirement to become Primary/Junior (K–6) teachers and were interviewed on their experiences with multilingual children during their practicums. Four major themes were found in the data: language hierarchies during practicums, subverting language hierarchies, translanguaging with families, and racialized experiences of speaking Mandarin. Much more than other grade-level placements, kindergarten placements were spaces where the candidates witnessed communication break down, with families and children refusing to speak English.

Experiment-driven rationalism

Philosophers debate about which logical system, if any, is the One True Logic. This involves a disagreement concerning the sufficient conditions that may single out the correct logic among various candidates. This paper discusses whether there are necessary conditions for the correct logic; that is, I discuss whether there are features such that if a logic is correct, then it has those features, although having them might not be sufficient to single out the correct logic. Traditional rationalist arguments suggest that the necessary conditions of thought are necessary and sufficient conditions singling out the correct logical and mathematical theories. In the contemporary debate, Chalmers advocates a view along this line. Jago, analogously, suggests that the necessary conditions for thought—or, as he calls them, our basic epistemic expectations—single out a family of logical and mathematical theories. Warren and Williamson, on the other hand, argue that there are no necessary conditions of thought. I argue that there are necessary conditions for thought, and these are necessary but not sufficient conditions to be the correct logic; indeed, these are features that all logics—correct or incorrect—share. No view we can understand is ruled out by the necessary conditions for thought, but we cannot understand quite any view. Human linguistic and conceptual abilities are genetically constrained, and these constraints are our best guide to the boundaries of logic. Arguing for this, I tackle two dogmas of modern rationalism: namely, the view that the biological constraints of human cognition have no bearing on the boundaries of the epistemic space, and the view that the boundaries of thought coincide with the boundaries of language.

Tattoos as multimodal semiotic assemblages

Abstract Drawing on interviews with, and images from, a selection of female participants, we develop the notion of semiotic assemblages to examine tattoos as mobile semiotic material for embodied meaning-making, with multi-located trajectories linking the tattooed bodies to different spatial networks. In turn, we draw on the social semiotic approach to multimodality by looking at assemblages of tattoos as vibrant material, pregnant with thing-power which, while re-making the bodies of individual tattoo owners, simultaneously shapes and semiotically remediates physical and affective (e.g. emotional and memorial) objects and feelings. We illustrate how corporeal materials and activities, and the incorporeal conceptual, perceptual and affective senses and feelings are remediated across boundaries of language, geography, semiotic modes, media, and chains of mediation to make meaning. We end with a suggestion that multimodal analysis of semiotic assemblages needs to take a multiscalar approach to account for mobilities, movements and flow, and the continuities and disconnections in forms and meanings the dynamics of the connectedness produce across different scales.

POEM IN MOTION: A UNIQUE BLEND OF EAST AND WEST IN SANDHYA RAJU’S PERFORMANCE POETRY OF MAYA ANGELOU’S POEM ‘PHENOMENAL WOMAN’

Dance is an ancient, universal art form that stirs the souls of the performer as well as the admirers. Dance has the power to heal, nourish, teach, and spread joy and peace. In India, a multicultural and multilingual country, innumerable folk, and classical dance forms have flourished and continue to be practised across villages, towns, and cities. Religious festivals, cultural gatherings, social movements, and youth programmes are incomplete without the rhythm and beauty of music and dance. On Feb 2, 2022, the eminent Kuchipudi danseuse Sandhya Raju launched a terpsichorean rendition of the famous poem ‘Phenomenal Woman’ written by the American poet and activist Maya Angelou and published in 1978, as a tribute to the former’s mother on her birthday. Raju, with her co-dancers from the Aayana Dance Company, made a creative interpretation of the poet’s powerful words, while adding a verse of her own which in turn emphasised the concepts of inner strength of a woman and the depth of mother-daughter bonding. The choreography largely borrows from Kuchipudi, a dance form with its origin in an eponymous village in Andhra Pradesh and founded in the classical Sanskrit treatise Natya Sastra. Angelou’s emphatic paean to the confidence and inner beauty of the woman fuses with the Indian performance art form to weave a mesmerising visual-aural experience to the viewer, bringing in an East-West blend that surpasses the boundaries of language, culture, and race.

Translation as Metonymy: Bijan Elahi’s Persian Variation on Cyrano de Bergerac

In this article, I develop a model for world literature as a patchwork comprised of translations that cross boundaries of language, genre, style and culture. Through a close reading of the modernist Iranian poet Bijan Elahi’s (d. 2010) translations of a poem by the Sufi martyr and poet al-Ḥallāj (d. 922) and the play Cyrano de Bergerac by the French playwright Edmond Rostand (1868–1918), I demonstrate how translation can be used as a comparative method to conjoin, constellate and patch texts and ideas together regardless of their similarities or differences.

HFD: Hierarchical feature decoupling for SQL generation from text

Text-to-SQL, a computational linguistics task, seeks to facilitate the conversion of natural language queries into SQL queries. Recent methodologies have leveraged the concept of slot-filling in conjunction with predetermined SQL templates to effectively bridge the semantic gap between natural language questions and structured database queries, achieving commendable performance by harnessing the power of multi-task learning. However, employing identical features across diverse tasks is an ill-suited practice, fraught with inherent drawbacks. Firstly, based on our observation, there are clear boundaries in the natural language corresponding to SELECT and WHERE clauses. Secondly, the exclusive features integral to each subtask are inadequately emphasized and underutilized, thereby hampering the acquisition of discriminative features for each specific subtask. In an endeavor to rectify these issues, the present work introduces an innovative approach: the hierarchical feature decoupling model for SQL query generation from natural language. This novel approach involves the deliberate separation of features pertaining to subtasks within both SELECT and WHERE clauses, further dissociating these features at the subtask level to foster better model performance. Empirical results derived from experiments conducted on the WikiSQL benchmark dataset reveal the superiority of the proposed approach over several state-of-the-art baseline methods in the context of text-to-SQL query generation.

How Long Will You Love Being “Upright”? The Danger of False Friends in Translation

Working in related languages can be beneficial in that knowledge of one language can be applied to another without having to learn each one individually. Unfortunately, assumed equivalence often leads to mistakes and misunderstandings caused by false friends—often referred to as “false cognates”—that is, words that appear similar across language boundaries and are therefore assumed to have the same meaning. While the issue of false friends has been discussed with regards to language learning for decades, false friends are not always obvious and can single-handedly render translations inaccurate, unacceptable, or both. The goal of this paper is to apply insights from existing studies on false friends to translation among related languages and Bible translation in particular. To clarify the nature of the issue, relevant terminology is discussed alongside examples from Bible translation in South Asia. Finally, the paper proposes potential steps forward for Bible translation practitioners to avoid the potential pitfalls of false friends.